A critical review of surveys in supply chain integration research

Over the past decade, one of the main themes in the supply chain management literature has been integration as a key factor in achieving improvements. Many authors agree that integrative practices and a high level of integration have a positive impact on corporate and supply chain performance. Recent empirical work shows convincing empirical evidence for the relationship between integration and performance. As the amount of survey-based research in the field is growing, it seems to be appropriate to summarise and evaluate the current situation. The aim of our paper is to review the survey-based research and to come up with a number of concerns with regard to the empirical survey-based research on the relationship between supply chain integration and performance. Based on those concerns, we investigate what might be the consequences for the theoretical background of the work done so far and for future scientific work